A Game of Spies
by Secretly-A-Fangirl
Summary: After getting shot in Russia, Cat thought she would be out of the game and spend the rest of her days raising her son, but how could she refuse to help her best friend when Ethan shows up at her house after witnessing all of their team members being murdered? She couldn't, and that's how Cat found herself immersed in the world of espionage once more with a price on her head.
1. Chapter 1

Catarina Alveres was certain of a few things in her life: that her lover was probably thinking up ways to murder her for leaving him alone with their two year old, and that _she_ was going to strangle Ethan Hunt with her bare hands. She was cold, barely dressed, and covered in fake blood that was going to leave her skin pink for a month—all because he thought two fake dead bodies would make the man confess faster. Of course, she should have known that it wouldn't move along any faster just because it was Ethan that came up with the idea—a last minute idea that left Catarina fully conscious and wondering when the Russian agent would cough up the name the team needed.

Next to her and growing colder by the second, was Claire Phelps, who was lucky enough to have been drugged so she would appear dead. Catarina was jealous of her, wishing she had just hid in her closet until Ethan and Jim had left instead of meeting them outside with a glass of chardonnay. She'd probably have better luck behind the false wall where everyone else was waiting; at least there she could swallow regularly. As it is, she was barely allowing herself to breathe and trying her damnedest not to let her teeth chatter too loudly.

"Dimitri…." The agent starts hesitantly, the first word Catarina's been able to understand since she entered the room. "….Miediev." With her eyes barely opened, she can see Hannah entering the room, holding a tray with two shot glasses. _Thank Christ_ , Catarina thinks as she waits for the agent to down the shot, _now I can breathe better_. The agent goes down with a _thunk_ and Catarina sits bolt upright in the bed, making a face as she attempts to wipe the fake blood off one of her thighs. The walls are pulled away as IMF agents begin to break the place down and Ethan walks over without the mask.

"How are you feelin', Cat," he asks as he injects the reviving serum into Claire's arm.

"I'm never coming back to Kiev," she grumbles irritably. "I mean, it's one thing to come to Russia with sensible clothing, but it's something else entirely to convince a big Russian guy that you're a prostitute when your lips are turning blue." She climbs over the still-unconscious Claire and picks up the heavy coat Ethan had pulled off, savoring the warmth.

"Come on, at least you didn't get injected with this stuff."

"I wouldn't have heard the guy blubbering if I had." With a half-smirk, Catarina walks over to Jack and takes his coffee from him, pressing the cup against her face with a satisfied hum. "Can I have this?" Jack shrugs with an easy smile, leaning back in his chair and tugging gently on Cat's wrist until she was sitting on his lap. They've known each other for years and there was nothing more than friendship between the pair, Jack and Catarina were a good team, but Cat and Ethan were even better. Ethan and Cat had trained together and usually shared the same missions since they could predict the other's line of thinking even if the plan they came up with would leave the others scratching their heads or backing away in apprehension. Of course, that doesn't mean they always got along, it just meant that their sparring matches often got very heated and usually ended with one of them being knocked unconscious.

"Hey, Cat, why don't you get the car ready so we can get back to the hotel," Jack asks, sipping from the cup Cat still had pressed against her cheek. She gives a slight nod, passing the cup back before getting to her feet and walking towards the exit. That's when the unexpected happened, a man stepped away from a group of Sweepers, raised the pistol he held in his hand, and fired a shot at Cat before she even had time to sound the alarm. The sound of the shot rang out in the warehouse and Cat dropped to the ground hard, clutching her side and squeezing her eyes shut. "Cat!"

"Get him," Ethan cries out, sprinting to kneel beside Cat with Jack right beside him as the others chase after the man. "Look at me, Cat." She barely opens her eyes, letting out a groan as Ethan applies pressure to the wound.

"I'm good," she manages to gasp out with a faint smile. "This remind you of anything?"

"You mean Budapest?" She lets out a breathless laugh, thankful that Jack was allowing her to use his lap as a pillow. "You and I remember Budapest very differently."

"You're right, you were the one shot that time." She lets out a sharp gasp as a stab of pain rushes through her again. "Hey, tell the guy that stitches me up that I want a lightening bolt." It's Ethan that laughs this time, shaking his head at his best friend's words. "God, I think it's time to retire."

"And do what, Cat? You gonna spend your days fishing?" He was trying to distract her, but it wasn't working as well as he'd hoped it would. Lucky for all of them that this wasn't Cat's first time getting shot, though this was more painful than the times before.

"Hell no, I hate fishing."

* * *

"Come on," she whispers," a little closer, a little closer." Her target was nearly there and once it reached the bait, then she would be able to snatch it up quickly enough. "A little closer…. That's it." With fast reflexes, she begins to reel in the fish with a triumphant grin and a little jump of excitement. It had worked and she would have enough fish for dinner tonight if she kept this up for a few more hours! She never noticed a man limping towards her as she freed the hook from the fish, and so she nearly jumped out of her skin when he spoke.

"I thought you hated fishing." She lets out a small scream, the fish flying out of her hands and back into the small lake and swimming away. She turns to face the man that spoke, glaring at him even though he had a good foot and a half on her and was certainly larger. He was also gorgeous with short dark brown hair, hazel eyes, and tanned skin; his mouth was small and his lips thin, his nose was straight, but he had a few bruises and scrapes in places.

"You look like shit," she returns after taking her friend in.

"Well, at least I don't spend my days fishing." She frowns down at the water before picking up her empty cooler and fishing pole.

"No, you spend your days getting disavowed and having a manhunt issued. Did you know they thought you were at my house? It certainly surprised them when they burst inside and found me in the kitchen in my panties and one of Alexander's shirts, but it surprised them more when I threw my coffee cup at them—my _favorite_ coffee cup."

"Are they still here?"

"No, they left a while ago and I stomped on all the bugs they placed around my house. Come on up, it's safe and you can tell me what the fuck actually happened Prague." Ethan follows her up the gently sloping hill and to the back door of her home, waiting patiently for her to open it and then following her into the spacious kitchen. He had to give it to her, she really had a nice place and it looked like she kept it clean.

"Jim is dead, Cat." Cat pauses for a moment, closing her eyes and biting her lip to keep from crying. "He was shot by a mole in the IMF."

"And the rest of the team?"

"All dead except for me and Claire, and we barely made it out alive." She nods, setting the pole and cooler down on the kitchen table and walking further into the house to the living room where Claire and Cat's lover were sitting on the couch with Cat's son lying between them. Isaac looks up when he hears them walk in, the two year old getting a big grin when he spots his godfather. "Hey, little man." Ethan scoops Isaac up into his arms before taking his place on the couch while Alexander moved to sit next to Cat on the love-seat across from the couch.

"It has to be pretty bad out there for you to come recruit me."

"Who says I'm recruiting you?"

"I do," Cat smiles, leaning forward slightly as the old excitement begins to resurface. "I can't exactly let you run around while hiding from IMF without tagging along to bail you out of trouble." Alexander clears his throat, sending his lover a pointed look and then looking to their son. "Relax, Alex, I'll come back."

"Come back without a few scars and I'll be surprised," he grumbles, knowing Cat well enough not to argue. She needed the excitement and adrenaline or else she'd go batty, and he knew fishing wasn't cutting it. Alexander stands and takes his son into his arms, sending Ethan a look now. "She comes back in one piece, understand."

"I'll do my best," Ethan nods sadly. It was a known fact that agents didn't always return to their families, but Alexander had been an IMF agent before he met Cat and knew the costs of it all; he also knew that Cat may not come home at all and he could be stuck raising Isaac by himself. "Do you still have your emergency bag packed, Cat?"

"It's in the hall closet," Cat says with a soft smile," Give me a few minutes to change out of my fishing clothes and I'll be ready to head out."

"I thought you hated fishing." She gives the older man a playful glare as she stands up.

"Fuck you, Hunt."


	2. Chapter 2

"Where did you ditch your car," Cat asks, leading the way outside and to the old Dodge pickup parked in her driveway.

"Uh, about a mile down the road," Claire answers as she climbs in the car, sandwiched between Ethan and Cat as they join her. Cat throws her bag in the backseat before starting the car and backing out. "It was at the old gas station." Cat smiles a little, driving fast down the dirt road and past the agents now parked a few feet down the road from her house. They must have decided to stay close after she'd destroyed the bugs they had planted. "Was that...?"

"Yep," Ethan nods, watching as the agents speed after them. "Can this thing go any faster?" With a smile, Cat pressed down on the gas and lets out a satisfied sigh. "You missed the rush, didn't you?"

"God, yes," she nods, speeding up more and making a sharp right down another dirt road that would take them to the main road in the small town a few miles away. The agents in their car followed, obviously having trouble seeing as Cat's truck tires stirred up the dirt and kicked it backwards to the windshield. "So, where are we headed?"

"Virginia." That made Cat grip the steering wheel a little tighter, fighting back a smile so she could pass as stern when she shoots a look at the two passengers. Ethan grins at her, inclining his head slightly to signal that her thoughts were correct. They were going to break into somewhere important there, but what was so important that Ethan would want inside? Who knows with Ethan, you could think he's going to do one thing when he's actually going to do the complete opposite, so there was no point in wondering until he decides to spill it. "Is that all right with you, Cat?"

"Whatever it is can't be any harder than when we broke into the FBI headquarters to drag a mole out."

"That was you two," Claire asks in shock. That story was passed around the IMF for years, though the names of the agents responsible had been changed to avoid criminal charges.

"It was our first mission together and E nearly fucked it all up."

"How was I supposed to know that the guy decided to eat with his secretary," Ethan remarks sheepishly. "He ate alone for nearly a month, so I figured he'd be doing the same thing that day."

"He didn't." Cat shakes her head, speeding up some more before making another sharp turn. "He and his secretary decided to devour each other instead and both were very surprised when I came in through the window." Claire laughs at this, looking between the pair in amusement. "I knocked the woman out and told the guy that his wife would find out about his indiscretion if he didn't climb back out the window with me. Needless to say, he came out willingly and was still begging me to remain silent as our guys were hauling him off."

"She's never going to let me live that down, though."

"Hell no, it'll be a family story and everyone will know how bad their Uncle E nearly screwed their mother over."

"Apparently the secretary was a trained assassin and was planning on poisoning our mole."

"And came after us when she woke up and realized what had happened."

"She chased us to Budapest, and we posed as newlyweds in one of the shops she tracked us to. I mean, we pulled on wigs and had masks and everything; she spoke with a bad French accent and I spoke with a German one."

"We would've gotten away with it if she didn't ask what we planned on naming our first child."

"Yeah, we both blurted out two different names and there's no recovering from that."

"So she shot Ethan, and then I shot her."

"My God," Claire says with another laugh. "You two really do come up with the craziest plans! What names did you use for your imaginary baby?"

"I used Adrian and lover boy here used Nate." Cat shakes her head again, joining Claire in her laughter as she speeds through the small town. No cops will chase after her, only one was on duty at the moment and he was stoned off his ass; the only people she had to worry about were the ones chasing her right now. "So, any idea on how we're gonna get in and how we're gonna do it with just the three of us?"

"Oh," Ethan replies, his grin widening," it's not just gonna be the three of us."

* * *

Cat hated trains after being forced to travel by train several times by her mother and her hatred hadn't dimmed over the years either. She paces the compartment, filled with nervous energy that prevented her from sitting still for longer than five minutes. She was sure that it was driving Claire insane, but it wouldn't be a big accomplishment considering most people in their line of work were nearly there anyway. They had recruited two other disavowed members of the IMF, and she knew the large black man sitting across from Claire and Ethan personally; Luther Stickell had helped her during her initial training and they'd been off and on friends ever since, though she rarely got the chance to talk to him after IMF kicked him out. She's never had the displeasure of meeting the other man, Franz Krieger, but he seems a little on the slimy side.

"Simple game," Ethan explains, finally breaking the silence," five players. Exfil opens the pocket, cyber ops lifts the wallet."

"Bank," Krieger inquires.

"IMF mainframe."

"Where exactly is it?"

"Langley."

"I'm sorry," Cat interrupts with a nervous laugh," I thought you said we were breaking into Langley." Ethan and Claire just stare at her, one of Ethan's brows cocked up and that infuriating grin on his lips. She nods dumbly for a moment, finally standing still as she looks at her two friends. The expression on Ethan's face was enough to confirm that she wasn't hearing things. "Okay, great, another illegal story to add to my track record. I don't know why I'd have a problem with that." She begins pacing again, wrapping and unwrapping a strand of hair around her finger in a nervous habit she'd picked up from her aunt. Could this really be harder than breaking into the J. Edgar Hoover building? She hoped not considering she had to play a window washer in order to get into the FBI, which wasn't an experience she wanted to try out again. She was fine with heights, but she didn't like standing on a platform more than thirty feet in the air that was wobbling with every gust of wind. Fuck that.

"If we're going to Virginia," Krieger states, standing up," why don't we drop by Fort Knox? I can fly a helicopter right through the lobby and set it down inside the vault. And it would be a hell of a lot easier than breaking into the goddamn CIA."

"Or I could throw you off this train for being a creepy little shit." He scowls down at Cat, but her expression has him backing down. It was an expression all moms were able to do, one that meant 'do what I said or you won't like the consequences.' She's used it on Ethan several times, though it never seems to affect him for some reason. "Trust me, if E says he's going to do it, then he'll find a way to do it without loss of limb." She hoped so, at least. Alexander would not be happy if she returned home with one less arm. Luther was calmer about the whole thing than Krieger, always so collected no matter the job or the risks.

"What are we downloading," he asks.

"Information," Ethan says, his vague answer only making Cat's nervous tugging on her hair increase.

"What kind?"

"Profitable." _Well, that just tells us everything_ , Cat thinks with a scowl in Ethan's direction. He ignored her with ease, his gaze fixed on Luther with a grin still in place. She didn't like that grin, that grin meant he would be tending to his adrenaline addiction.

"Payment on delivery," Claire adds when Ethan doesn't continue. Cat lets out a huff, snatching Krieger's cigarette out of his hand and taking a long drag from it, letting the nicotine fill her lungs before she slowly lets it out. She'd missed cigarettes when she was pregnant with Isaac and this is the first one she's had since she found out she was pregnant. Calming slightly, she goes back to pacing, the cigarette held between two fingers. _At least I'm not shaking anymore_.

"I don't know," Luther says after a moment, placing his sunglasses in a pocket inside his white suit jacket. Who even bothered with sunglasses on a train when the windows were tinted? "I just don't know." Krieger moves past Cat, snatching the remains of his cigarette back before sitting down and stamping it out in the ash tray.

"This doesn't sound like the Luther Stickell I heard of," Ethan taunts, sitting forward, looking at Claire and then at Cat before meeting Luther's gaze again. "What did they used to call you, the Net Ranger? Phineas Phreak? The only man alive who actually hacked into NATO Ghost Com." He was playing to Luther's ego and that worked almost every time.

"There was never any physical evidence that I had anything to do with that. With that...That exceptional piece of work." He was grinning now, nearly matching Ethan's as he grows excited about the new job.

"You know what else there was never any physical evidence of," Cat asks, sitting on the arm of Claire's seat, her hands pressed against the table. "That two IMF agents broke into the FBI and yanked out a mole." That was the one story that wasn't completely hushed up by the IMF, so it was the one she enjoyed telling the most. "But just like with your little game, it still might have happened." When she knew she had Luther's and Krieger's complete attention, she continues. "NATO is nothing compared to what we need you to do at Langley."

"Y'all are kidding yourselves. Even with top of the line crypto, cray access, STU-III..."

"Krieger can get all of that, can't you," Claire interrupts.

Krieger gives her a look, setting his glass of expensive wine back on the table and resting his elbows on his knees before answering," May take a little time."

"What the hell do you mean," Ethan demands before turning to glance at Claire and Cat again. "And here I was believing what Claire said about him was true." Cat gives a disappointed shrug, shaking her head. Luther, smiling widely, continues listing the things he'd need.

"Thinking-machine laptops," he tells Krieger," I'm talking about the 686 prototypes with the artificial intelligence risk chip."

"Twenty-four hours," Krieger replies. With a laugh, Luther faces the the leader of the operation, his hands clasped together.

"And I get to keep the equipment when we're through."

"Well, it'd be stupid to return something that amazing," Ethan agrees.

"Look, uh, I can't just hack my way inside. See, there's no modem access to the mainframe. It's in what we call the stand-alone, which means I'd have to be physically at the terminal." If Cat knew Ethan, and she liked to think that she did, then he would already have most of this thought through.

"Relax, Luther, it's much worse than you think." _What the hell is that supposed to mean?_ "The terminal is in a black vault lock down and the only person allowed in the room has to pass through a series of security checks. The first is a voiceprint identification and a six-digit access code, but this only gets him into the outer room. Next, he has to pass a retinal scan. And finally, the intrusion countermeasures are only deactivated by a double-electronic keycard which we won't have." Cat pinches the bridge of her nose, trying to figure out Ethan's plan on sneaking in. "Inside the black vault, there are three systems operating whenever the technician is out of the room. The first is sound-sensitive, anything above a whisper sets it off. The second system detects any increase in temperature, even the body heat of an unauthorized person in the room will trigger it if the temperature rises just a single degree. That temperature is controlled by the air conditioning coming in through an overhead duct, thirty feet above the floor."

"Are there any security measures covering the vent," Cat inquires, wondering if she could get her hands on those plans.

"Yeah, they're guarded by a laser net." That could be easily taken care of if they decided to use the vents. "The third system is on the floor, and is pressure-sensitive. The slightest increase in weight will trigger the alarm. If any one of these systems is set off, then they will activate an automatic lock down. Believe me when I tell you, all three systems are state-of-the-art."

"We're gonna crawl through those vents, aren't we?"


	3. Chapter 3

Cat grumbles as she changes from the comfortable dress she had been wearing into office attire—a white blouse, black skirt, black blazer, knee-high boots, and a pair of glasses that would record everything she saw. Carefully, she slides her pocket knife into the sheath in her boot, not wanting to go into Langley virtually naked where weapons were concerned. "You ready, Cat," Ethan calls through the bathroom door.

"I don't know," she retorts, stepping out for his inspection," does it look like I could kill someone with only a few moves?"

"Yes."

"And if you didn't know who I was?"

"Oh, still yes, but a little less than the first time you asked me." He pats her on the shoulder with a grin, Cat grinning back with a playful slap to his arm. "Okay, have you got the plan down?" The pair walks back to the main room where everything was being set up; the motel room paid for by Cat's uncle to avoid them being detected too soon. At Cat's nod, Ethan pauses and cups her face with both hands. "Are you sure about this, Cat?"

"If I wasn't sure, then I would be here." She pushes the door open and leads the way inside, all kinds of technical doohickeys spread across nearly every flat surface. Luther was busy tampering with one of the laptops, looking like a kid that had won an all-access pass to Willy Wonka's chocolate factory. Claire was curled up on one of the beds, reading over some of the plans while Krieger was smoking by the window. Cat easily navigated her way past all of the mess over to the dresser, brushing a few coins off the top and into her hand before facing Ethan again and depositing the coins in his pocket.

"What was that for?"

"The last time you were suspended by a wire, you hit your head on the floor and nearly ruined the entire operation, E." To emphasize her words, she delivered a poke to the center of his forehead. "The coins go in your shoes to help balance out your weight."

"Thanks."

"You can thank me once this whole thing is over with. I prefer my thank you gifts to be in candy form, you know the kind." With a smile, Cat lies down on the other bed and stares up at the ceiling, giving herself a chance to fully relax until it was time. She was supposed to take the secretary's spot outside the vault, a mask and voice patch already created and stored in her emergency bag. It was Cat's job to stall for time in case the nausea medicine Claire slips the tech doesn't work right away or wears off too soon.

"You look a little worried, baby girl," Luther remarks without looking up from the laptop. "You sure you'll be okay with this?"

"Just worry about yourself, old man." Cat hears Luther give a small huff of laughter and smiles a little herself despite the worry eating away at her stomach. _Would Alex remember to get Isaac to the day care in time? Does he remember the schedule I have Isaac on?_ It was difficult to say since Alexander had a bad memory after multiple head traumas in the field. Besides, Isaac was a Mommy's Boy during the night and he was used to talking to Cat even while she was deep under cover, but she couldn't risk it right now.

"You should call them," Claire says, setting the plans down and moving to sit beside Cat on the other bed. "Let them know you're okay."

"You know I can't do that yet." Not being able to talk to her lover was annoying, but not being able to talk to her son was downright killing her. She didn't even know if the IMF has swooped in and put Isaac into protective custody or not.

"Catarina, go and call them."

"I can't." Her voice broke at the end and she had to bite her lip to keep from sobbing. When she was younger, dying in the field was like some far off thing, but now she knew it was a real possibility and it might happen sooner than she'd like.

"Cat," Ethan says softly," it's time."

"Right," she nods, gratefully rising and moving over to her bag. "Help me with this stupid thing." She makes sure the voice patch is situated where it should be and lets Ethan slide the mask over her face, smoothing out all the wrinkles and creases using the mirror, and then putting in the contacts. "Is the secretary taken care of, Krieger?"

"Mm," he answers," she's about to leave now." Cat would have to steal the woman's keycard and use it to get back inside; claim to have left her wallet behind in order to avoid suspicion. As for the real secretary, she thinks she won a trip to Jamaica. _It's time to get the ball rolling_.

* * *

"Can I get you anything," the tech asked, interrupting Cat's daydream of sitting at home and watching those stupid talk shows that make up daytime TV.

"No, thank you," she replies distractedly, giving the man a brief smile before returning her eyes to the monitor. She could hear a faint beeping coming through her earpiece, Luther having activated the fire alarms in order for Krieger, Claire, and Ethan to sneak inside as firemen. Once the door was shut behind the man, Cat lets out the breath she'd been holding. "Claire, he's all yours."

"Thanks," Claire responds quietly. Cat leans back in the chair, holding her compact up to examine the bobbed hairstyle the secretary had.

"Hey, E, how do you think I'd look with a bob?"

"Besides terrible," Ethan laughs. "Probably worse than you did in our first year of training when you had that perm."

"Hey, I liked that perm."

"Are you kidding? You looked like Captain Hook."

"Love you, too." She scoots the chair back a little, beginning to go through the desk drawers as Ethan begins his climb into the vents. The top middle drawer was locked, but Cat had it opened in a matter of seconds with the help of one of her bobby pins. "There has to be something good in this drawer if she keeps it locked."

"Tell me if it's as interesting as you hope," Luther says through the earpiece. She pulls the drawer open, finding only a plain manila envelope.

"It's an envelope."

"But what's _in_ the envelope?" She opens it and spills the contents out on the desk, finding a few vacation photos of the secretary with two different men and a little girl.

"Well, she's either two years older than her son, or she's living a double life and keeps the evidence here where her hubby can't find it. I have to say, though, she looks better in a bikini than I do."

"Vacation photos the only things in the envelope?" She shakes the envelope and then peeks inside just to be certain before confirming Luther's disappointment. "Damn, that's just boring."

"I know." Cat piles the photos back into the envelope and then stuffs the envelope back into the desk drawer, but her hand brushes something when she pulls it out. Curious, she takes the hidden object with her, staring down at a burner phone. She flips it open and turns it on, scrolling through the messages after that's done. "Okay, you remember that one couple we were monitoring that had some pretty raunchy phone sex?"

"Yeah?"

"These texts make that look tame."

"I hate to interrupt," Claire says with some amusement," but he's heading back your way." Fighting a laugh, Cat re-tapes the phone inside the drawer and closes it as Ethan tests how loud he'll be able to speak before it's too loud.

"Toast," he states, the keyword for too loud," toast."

"I'd love some," Cat smiles.

"Check," Luther replies with a laugh, but a loud sneeze makes all of them flinch. The noise caused the small speaker in the earpiece to let out a high-pitched whine and it's a damn good thing the tech wasn't in there because Cat nearly fell out of her chair.

"Krieger, from here on in, absolute silence," Ethan instructs sternly. Cat lets out a grumble, straightening up and fixing her wig.

"Did you remember the coins Cat gave you, Ethan?"

"Yeah, I put them in earlier." As the line goes quiet, Cat draws in a breath and holds it right as the door slides open to admit the tech. She lets out her breath slowly as she stands and walks over to the retinal scan, the small device in the contacts confusing the electronics into thinking she really was the secretary. She peeks inside the vault as the tech enters, her dark eyes fixing on where Ethan was hanging out of the vent shaft. If something happened right now, then they're all going to be royally screwed and then some. As the tech shut the door completely, Cat returned to her seat to wait it out, grimacing when the sound of the tech vomiting reaches her through the speaker.

"I could have gone my whole life without hearing that," she quips, waiting for the tech to open the door again. He does so a second later, carrying a trash can with him. "You okay, you look a little pale?" He only lets out a groan, hurrying out of the room and across the hall to the bathroom. "You're good for now, E."

"I need the information to log in, Luther."

"D-O-N-L-O-E W-I-L-L-I-A-M," Luther reports in a whisper, waiting for Ethan to type out the name before moving on to the password. "A-W-9-6-B-6." There's a moment of quiet before Luther breaks it again. "Holy mother of God. The NOC List."

"What about the NOC List," Cat asks, pulling the phone back out and going back to the texts.

"He's taking the NOC List."

"Well, I'll be damned."

"That's all you have to say about this?"

"No, I'm talking about the texts. The whole NOC List thing seemed pretty obvious since there's nothing else here worth risking our lives for." She tries to make herself a little more comfortable, but the office chair prevented that and it didn't help that she was shorter than the secretary so her feet didn't touch the ground. "Sally here is seeing our tech on the side. How the hell does she manage two boyfriends and a husband when I can barely handle my son and my boyfriend?" When no one responds, she goes quiet, exiting out of the text messages and moving on to the pictures until the door began to open. "Shit," she hisses," mayday." She stands too quickly, swaying on her feet as Donloe, William—winner of the Pervert Olympics—walks inside. Thinking quickly, she allows herself to fall and save Ethan some time.

"Are you okay," the man asks, rushing over and dropping to his knees to help Cat—or Sally as he thought—into a sitting position.

"I don't know." Cat keeps her voice breathy, playing the confused secretary well. _I could win a fucking Oscar at this rate_. "I was standing up to do the retinal scan with you and everything just went dark."

"Maybe there's a bug going around?"

"Mm, maybe." She furrows her brow, clutching at her head as Donloe helps her up and allows her to lean against him. She tried not to get to close, knowing well that her boobs were slightly larger than Sally's after breastfeeding for a year.

"Toast," Luther warns," toast." Cat could hear the sound of rope against metal, pretending to fall again to make sure that Ethan made it back into the vent. "Alright, baby girl."

"Shall we?" Pretending to be unsteady on the high heels of her boots, she moves to the scanner and waits on Donloe to follow behind. He inserts his card and leans forward for the scan, and then gives Cat some room to do the same before resting his hand on her lower back.

"You should wear those heels to work more often," he murmurs as he moves past her into the room. Cat had managed to keep the smile on her face even as he turned his back to open the door, her eyes finding a knife sticking out of the tabletop that held the computer. She turns Donloe around to face her before he could notice the knife, pressing her lips against his and trying not to grimace from how squishy his lips were. When she pulls back, he's suitably dazed and she moves to gather her belongings.

"I'm taking my lunch break." After the door slid closed behind her, she lets out a noise of disgust and wipes her mouth on the sleeve of her blazer to get the taste of breath mints off her lips. "Y'all are gonna have to shoot me before I do that again," she growls to the team, walking as quickly as she could out of the building without drawing attention to herself.

"You okay, baby girl," Luther asks as she joins him in the fire truck, looking a little too amused for her liking. "Need anything—a Tic-Tac, toothpaste?"

"How about a Rabies shot and some liquor?"

"You don't drink anymore, remember?"

"A horrible decision on my part." The others join them a few minutes later, each of the team donning the heavy yellow jackets that firemen wear and squeezing uncomfortably in the cab—Claire forced to sit on Luther's lap and Cat forced to sit on Ethan's in order for all of them to fit.

"Well," Ethan sighs," that went better than expected."


	4. Chapter 4

Dressed back into a simple black tank top, ripped jeans, a jacket, and ankle boots, Cat felt more like herself; she'd also brushed her teeth twenty times once they got back to the motel. They didn't stay long, Cat's favorite uncle allowing them use of his private plane in order to get to London without the threat of IMF hanging over their heads. Not for the first time, Cat thanked God that her uncle was nothing like her useless father. She leans back on the new bed of the hotel, her feet crossed at the ankles and a disposable cell in her hand. She and Alex weren't stupid; they each had a phone with a secured line that the government knew nothing about (for once she was glad of her husband being paranoid). "Are you sure that you're okay," Alex was asking for the third time in the last ten minutes of conversation.

"I'll be fine when I'm back home with Isaac in my arms," Cat replies, her eyes closed as she pictured her son's face. He was small for his age, born a month early after a terrorist tried to use Cat as a human shield, but he had Cat's dark brown hair and his father's hazel eyes, a small pointed noise, and a bone structure that most would kill for. He was her beautiful boy and she would die before she let anything happen to him. "How's Isaac doing?"

"Pretty good, I told him you went out to save the world again like I used to and now he keeps telling his friends that his mommy is actually part of the Avengers." Cat can't help but laugh at that, even as tears threatened to spill over. "He misses you, Cat."

"I miss him too." She and Alex had been good friends in basic training, but the birth of their son hadn't changed the fact that neither of them loved each other the way parents should, so they each saw other people while maintaining their friendship. "Have you introduced him to Kara yet?" Kara was Alex's latest girlfriend and a teacher at the school Isaac would attend for head start next year. She and Cat got along well enough, but Alex wanted to hold back on introducing her to Isaac until he was sure that they wouldn't break up after only two months of seeing each other.

"Yeah, but he didn't seem to like her too much."

"That sucks." Cat pauses, watching as Krieger confronts Ethan about the meeting with the buyer. She'd been expecting this for a while and is surprised it's taken Krieger this long, though she supposed the liquid courage helped with that. "Babe, I gotta go, I'll call you when I can."

"Alright, I'll tell little man that you send your love."

"Thanks." She snaps the phone closed, slowly rising from the bed and resting her hand on her pistol that rested on the bedside table. It would be easy for her to shoot Krieger without the man even having time to turn around, but she's not the type to shoot people in the back and certainly doesn't feel like disposing of a body this late at night when she could be sleeping. Krieger marches over to Ethan's desk and shoves a pile of papers to the floor, as though hoping that might get Ethan's temper rising, but all it succeeds in doing is making Krieger look like a pre-K bully.

"You're not going to any meeting without me," he states, his accent thicker now that he'd been drinking. Ethan looks back down at the bible, trying to finish typing out the passage.

"My contact is extremely shy," Ethan lies with ease.

"I don't think you're in any position to give orders." Krieger had walked to the front of the desk, reaching into his coat pocket. The second his hand disappeared, Cat had the pistol directed at his chest, her hands steady as she aimed it. She wouldn't kill him yet; she'd incapacitate him by shooting him in the knee, just to teach him a lesson. "Do you? Not while I'm holding this." He pulls his hand out of his pocket, Cat chambers a round, and then Krieger reveals the disk with the NOC List on it. Too bad he's stupid enough to think that Ethan would leave the real one lying around the room. At least, she hopes the disk in his hand is empty.

"Krieger," Claire says in a scolding tone. Cat rolls her eyes, flipping on the safety and setting the gun back down on the side table.

"Ta gueule." As Krieger as telling Claire to shut up, Ethan had moved to his briefcase and pulled out the real NOC List, flicking it in order to regain Krieger's attention.

"Don't you mean this," he asks, holding it up for everyone to see. Cat smiles, joining Claire in the doorway to watch the scene unfold. Knowing Ethan, something dramatic yet funny was about to take place.

"That's not the list." Krieger holds the blank disk up now, shaking it a little for emphasis.

"Oh, what's the matter? You...You've never seen this trick?" As he spoke, Ethan held both of his arms up and to the side, making the disk disappear up his sleeve like a street magician might do to a card or a coin. Ethan feigned shock as he looked around for the disk, shooting me a grin since this was a trick he often performed for Isaac when he came down to visit. "Where'd it go?" He walks away from the briefcase and over to where Claire and Cat were standing, rubbing his jaw in mock confusion. "It's gone." And then he pointed at Claire, giving Krieger an amused look. "You."

"No," Claire laughs.

"No?" He reaches between her cardigan and blouse, coming out empty-handed. "No, hmm." And then he turns to Cat, the brunette leaning against the door and sending him a wink. "Oh, definitely you." He reaches into the back pocket of her jeans, pretending to extract the disk while in reality he just let it slide out of his sleeve and into his hand. He holds the disk above his head again with a shit-eating grin for Krieger. "It was gone, but not too far." The grin still in place, he walks over and thumps the disk against Krieger's forehead, earning a small laugh from Cat. "I know what you're thinking, Krieger. You're thinking, 'back in the computer room, I was up here, he was- he was down there.'" Ethan moves away from the Frenchman, growing serious again. "Yes, and he was..." Ethan holds his hands out again, the disk vanished again and Claire laughing a little louder. "He was carrying two disks." He turns to face everyone. "It's so hard to keep track of these things."

"Where is it," Krieger inquires. Ethan pats himself down, giving everyone a grin as he pats his left pocket, and then pulls the disk out.

"Do you actually think I'd let you have the NOC List?" Suitably defeated for the moment, Krieger offers a lame threat instead.

"Try any sleight of hand with my money, I'll cut your throat."

"Then you'd better move faster than the .22 that my pistol shoots," Cat warns, walking further into the sitting room. Krieger scoffs, throwing the fake disk in the trash can and storming out of the room. "I don't trust that man as far as I can throw him."

"That's because you're smart," Ethan remarks, picking up the bible that Krieger had thrown at some point. "Why don't you go and talk to little man, tell him his godfather loves him." Cat studies him for a moment before wrapping her arms around him and pulling him into a hug, knowing whatever thoughts just passed through his head had been dark. "I love you, Cat."

"Love you too, E."

* * *

Just as Cat thought she could be done with trains, Ethan drags her on another one with a plan that might have all of them in handcuffs or shot by the end of the day. At least this time she was wearing clothes she picked out, though—a black off the shoulder top with a black tank underneath, black pants with multiple buckles running down the legs and a belt across the waist, calve-high boots with a thick heel, and a black jacket that's back stopped at the top of her boots, and the front stopped mid-thigh. She was feeling confident in the outfit, but she felt relatively safe with the gun tucked in the holster strapped to her hip.

She was sitting behind the people Ethan identified as Max and her two goons, meant to listen in on their conversation and intervene if necessary. As it was, she was trying not to fidget too much in her seat as the train sped past the hilly landscape outside. She didn't even look out the window, the sight of blurred trees and sky made her feel nauseous and she doubted anyone would be happy that she missed something because she was busy puking in the bathroom. The ringing of a cell phone behind her made Cat jump, barely turning her head to look at the pair behind her. "It's him," the first goon states, handing the phone to the woman beside him. For some reason, the fact that Max, an international arms dealer, was a woman made Cat smile.

"This was not what we discussed," Max says into the phone, Cat barely able to pick it up over the sound of her teeth chattering. She still didn't know for sure why trains made her like this, but it's only gotten worse over the years and she blames her mother. After a moment, Max leans over and pulls the black cloth out from under her seat, Claire having taped it there before anyone else boarded. The disk was inside and Cat had to use her compact in order to see the goon inserting it into the disk-drive connected to the laptop. There was silence as the NOC List was translated on the screen. "Dear boy," Max laughs quietly," I hope this doesn't preclude a meeting in private."

"Did you know she was British," Cat murmurs to Luther, the man sitting across the aisle from her. He heard her through the earpiece and she saw his smile in the mirror of her compact.

"The mere possibility is worth ten million dollars. Baggage car, rack three." She's certainly happy, but we're expecting an extra person involved in this scheme. "Silver briefcase, combination 3-1-4... Wouldn't worry about him. When you get the money, he'll find you." So Job's close by. Ethan hadn't told her about the third person until just before they left the hotel in separate cars, but he kept the person's real identity to himself like he was afraid to let the name pass his lips. A faint buzz reaches her ears and she gives a little smile. Luther was doing his job and preventing them from sending out the list. "What's the matter?"

"It's not transmitting," the goon says in confusion.

"Try it again. Damn it, I have to get this through before we hit the tunnel." Oh great, there's going to be a damn tunnel and everything's gonna go dark. This really wasn't Cat's lucky day. "What's the problem?" Cat holds the compact up a little higher, pretending to apply a new coat of lipstick while getting a glimpse of the laptop screen where a bright red strip with black writing appeared at the bottom of the screen. The problem for them was that Luther was too damn good for an amateur goon to beat him.

"Connection denied." The more they argued the wider Cat's smile became until she noticed two familiar men in trench coats slowly making their way towards her. She closes the compact and rises from her seat, grabbing her purse before slowly making her way down the aisle, tapping Luther's arm as she passes.

"Ethan," Claire says, her voice soft through the earpiece," Kittridge is on the train."

"He's in the same area as Max," Cat adds, pretending to scratch her cheek in order to get the microphone closer to her mouth; the tiny device had been installed in one of the buttons on the sleeve of her coat.

"The money's in the baggage car," Ethan responds," I'll meet the two of you there." Cat made it there before Claire, looking around the dark room until her eyes landed on the familiar form of the man she'd thought dead.

"Oh my God..." She covers her mouth with her hands, back pressed against the door to help her stay standing.

"Not quite," Jim says tiredly, standing up and walking into the light so Cat could see him better. She moves closer to him, resting her hand against his cheek and truly believing it to be Jim until a familiar scent wafted to her. As the recognition dawned on her, the impostor gave a familiar, though sad, smile that looked out of place on Jim's face. "I'm glad you got here first, Cat."

"Why are you dressed like this, E?" Her best friend was dressed in the coat Jim had loved the most and had even pulled on a mask of the man's face, capturing age spots and wrinkles.

"You'll see in a second, but I need you to hide right now." She crouches down low as Ethan resumes the spot he'd been sitting in before Cat entered, hunching himself over and further in the shadows. For once, Cat was glad of how short she was since it made it easier to hide without being too squished behind the crates. Seconds after Cat had hidden, the door to the baggage car opened again and she could make out the low-heeled shoes of Claire from the inch of space between the floor and crate bottom.

"Ethan's right behind me," the other woman warns, unaware that it was Ethan she was talking to. "Listen, Jim, is it such a good idea to kill him?" Ethan stays silent; wanting to hear everything Claire had to say before he revealed himself. "Kittridge is here." Cat watched as the shoes began to move closer. "We take the money. Ethan takes the blame. No one else has seen you alive." Cat closes her eyes and steadies her breathing, a feeling of betrayal hitting her hard. Had she been on that mission with the others, then she may have been sent home in a box. "No one will believe him." She's reached Ethan now and came to a stop; Cat's fingers itching to un-holster her pistol and shoot Claire in the ankle before delivering a head-shot. Cat could hear the sound of a mask wrinkling before it hit the ground.

"Of course, I'm very sorry to hear you say that, Claire." The trench coat hit the ground next and then Ethan was helping Cat to stand up again. She was furious, and not even the fear of the train she was in could interrupt the emotions running wild. Claire looked like a doe in the headlights, pretty brown eyes wide and her bottom lip trembling.

"Ethan...Cat?"

"Yes," said a voice from behind the betrayed agents. They turn as the door behind them opens to reveal Jim, holding a pistol. "Ethan Hunt and Catarina Alveres, darling. You remember them, don't you?" Ethan and Cat take a few steps back, Ethan standing half in front of Cat in an unconscious form of protection. Again, Cat's fingers ached to wrap around the butt of her pistol, but Jim would shoot her before she even lowered her hands to grab for it.

"You knew about Jim?"

"Of course. Just exactly when he knew is something of a question. Cat, on the other hand, poor thing just found out and now she has to pay that price with her best friend. "Ethan, did you find out before or after I showed up in London?"

"Before London," Ethan admits" but after you took the bible from the Drake Hotel in Chicago." That had Cat confused for a second until she remembered that Jim had been away during the Kiev mission, he was recruiting and must have lifted the bible while he was staying there. She also remembered that Ethan had used a phrase from the bible to confirm it was him while messaging Max and he'd gotten a weird look on his face when he saw the inside cover of the book.

"They stamped it, didn't they? Those damn Gideons."

"Too bad such a small thing caused your plan to blow up in your face," Cat retorts bitterly. "Weren't you the one that told me never to leave a trace of myself behind when the mission was complete? You're getting clumsy in your old age." Frowning, Jim fires off a warning shot, the bullet grazing Cat's ear. Cat barely flinches, the wound stinging, but nowhere near the worst one she's ever received in this line of work. Jim would be dead before all of this was over, and she might be too.

This really, really wasn't turning out to be Cat's day.


	5. Chapter 5

"In all fairness, Ethan, Claire was never convinced her charms would work on you even if Cat wasn't around," Jim says, his smug tone only making Cat's temper rise," but I was supremely confident, having tasted the goods." That was something I could have gone without hearing. "'Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife.'"

"Thou probably shouldn't piss off a woman with a gun either," Cat remarks under her breath, slowly beginning to reach for her gun. "Or did you forget that one, asshole?" The look she gave him would have sent Lucifer running for the hills and Jim's mouth gave a small twitch to show it affected him more than he let on.

"Let's just get the money and get out of here," Claire pleads, looking to her husband.

"Yes," Jim agrees," let's get the money." Claire holds out her hand expectantly, sending the two friends she just lost apologetic stares. But that wasn't enough for Cat, she didn't want an apology, she wanted them to hurt.

"Ethan, the money." After sharing a look with Cat, the younger woman giving a slight shrug of her shoulders, Ethan holds one side of his jacket open for Claire to reach inside.

"You've earned it," Ethan mutters when Claire takes the envelope. Cat looks down at her feet as Claire pulls out the bills and counts them quickly before handing them off to Jim, Cat wishing she'd kept that envelope full of vacation photos to switch with the cash. Sure, she may have been shot for her trouble, but at least it would have been one last fuck you before she died. "You know, Claire was wrong about one thing, Jim."

"Oh," Jim asks, not really caring. He would shoot everyone soon and Cat knew what was coming. "What's that?" Ethan gestures to the breast pocket of his jacket, letting Jim know he was reaching inside to avoid being shot too soon. What he pulls out has Cat letting out a small laugh, it was the glasses that would record everything, the glasses Ethan had worn to get the NOC List at Langley, and they had recorded the entire conversation. Growing bold, Ethan slides the glasses on, looking straight ahead at Jim to get a good picture of his face.

"Morning, Mister Phelps," Kittridge says, tuned into the frequency they were using to communicate.

"Cat and I aren't the only ones who've seen you alive."

"You son of a bitch," Jim mutters in shock.

"Aw, come on," Cat jokes," his mother's a nice lady, don't call her a bitch."

"It's over, Jim," Ethan adds, he and Cat sharing twin grins. No matter what happened now, IMF would hunt Jim down and take him out. Ethan tosses the glasses over to Jim, Cat having a pretty good guess what was about to happen when Jim throws them to the ground and Claire tries to talk sense into him. He's too far down the rabbit hole for any common sense to reach him and now he's angry enough to kill. Before anyone else could move, Jim fired off a shot that hit Claire in the stomach, then Ethan was on him to get the gun away and Cat was using Claire's jacket to slow the bleeding.

"This remind you of anything?"

"K-Kiev," Claire nods, wincing in pain. "I think my wound is worse than yours, though."

"Yeah, that's for sure." Claire allowed her eyes to close, blood soaking into the fabric of her jacket as she bled out, and then her breathing came to a stop. "She's gone, E!" Cat turns as Jim runs past, launching herself at him and grabbing hold of one of his legs until he kicked out at her. The heel of his boot connected with the side of her head and Cat was seeing stars, left dazed on the floor as he and Ethan disappeared through the hatch that led to the top of the train. "Christ on a stick." She was dizzy as she got to her feet, climbing on the ladder just far enough to see which direction the men had disappeared in and finding both of them clinging for dear life as a helicopter drew closer. "Krieger, you dick," she hisses when she recognizes the helicopter.

Cat ducks back inside and stumbles towards the end of the train closer to the action, still woozy from the kick and seeing double. She opens the door as everything goes dark from the tunnel, moving to stand beside a conductor that was yelling into his walkie-talkie to the driver at the other end of the train. "No," he shouted frantically," don't, it'll crash into us! Accelerate, accelerate!" Cat and the man lock gazes when she stands beside him, Cat giving him a little smile and probably traumatizing him further since the side of her head was a dark blue and bleeding a little.

"How's it going?" Patting the man's shoulder, she looks out the large window in front of her and found the helicopter inside the tunnel, connected to the train by a thick chord that was probably meant to help Jim on board. She couldn't see Jim or Ethan anywhere, so they're either still on top of the train or grease smears on the tracks. Just as she was getting even more concerned, Jim slid down the front of the train and clutched desperately at the windshield wiper. He meets Cat's gaze long enough for her to show him the finger she's proudest of, then, scowling, he turns and motions for Krieger to come closer. "Don't you dare, you little bitch," she grumbles, her hands on the counter to steady herself as she leans forward.

"What the hell is happening?!"

"Isn't it obvious? Those two fuckers are stirring up a whole load of trouble and I'll have a shit ton of paperwork to do if we survive this!" Cat throws her hands up in the air, the poor conductor letting out a screech at her sudden movement. "Do me a favor, if you think you're about to pee yourself or vomit, do it in the next car." Krieger came closer, allowing Jim to grab onto the landing skids right as Ethan took Jim's spot on the front of the train. Cat hits the glass to get his attention, throwing her hands up in a 'the hell you think you're doing' motion he was all too familiar with. He gives her an uncertain grin and a shrug. Krieger was coming in closer now, the blade whirring right over Ethan's back. One wrong move and he'd be in multiple pieces. "Don't move!"

"No shit," he shouts back, Cat having to read his lips. It was terrifying to watch the scene, especially since she was unable to leave the car and help her best friend. Shaking again, she held onto the conductor's arm tight enough to leave bruises, and the man was holding her with his free arm just as tightly. This could be the last time she saw her best friend; hell, she might see him be murdered and she was helpless to prevent it.

"No," she whimpers, eyes wide as she watched," no, no, no, no, no..." Just as suddenly as the blades were over him, Krieger was forced to even out because the blades had hit the roof of the tunnel. "Yes," she cries out as Ethan wraps his arms and legs around the other part of the landing gear opposite Jim, Cat changing her position so that she and the conductor were hugging. Ethan sticks something against the front of Krieger's helicopter and then jumps back to the train, motioning wildly for Cat and the conductor to get down. Cat drags the man down with her to their knees, trying to see what Ethan had stuck against the helicopter to cause Jim to look so panicked and pissed. Her question is answered a short second later when the helicopter explodes, the shock wave forcing Cat and the man all the way to the ground.

Hurting worse than before after landing on her arm, Cat sits up as well as she can to check on her best friend. He was on his back this time with his head tilted as far back as he could manage, the jagged point of one of the blades was right under Ethan's chin, and the metal inches from his bared throat as his and Cat's eyes met again. The train had stopped just before the blade could slit his throat and the conductor slowly sits up next to Cat to look outside. The man takes one look at the situation, looks at Cat in bewilderment, and then falls backwards in a dead faint. Cat could imagine how he felt, but she didn't have time to faint yet. She gets to her feet, sore arm cradled against her chest, and opens the door for Ethan to climb in.

"You okay," he asks once inside again.

"I broke my wrist." She holds it up for Ethan to see, her wrist looking dented while the bone pressed against the surface of the flesh, not yet poking through it. "But at least I didn't get shot this time."

"There's always that." Leaning heavily on each other, they make their way through the compartments until they reach the car holding the IMF agents, Max, and Luther. "What the hell took you so long?"

"Jesus, Kittridge, we could have been killed and all you're doing is focusing on an arm's dealer."

 ***~::~*~::~*~::~*~*LATER*~::~*~::~*~::~*~***

Her arm in a sling and her emergency bag over her shoulder, Cat struggled to push the door open and step inside, kicking the door shut behind her. It was quiet in the house, though she could tell that Alexander still managed to keep the place clean since all the toys were in their proper places. Cat walks over to the stairs, taking them slowly and wincing when her muscles protest at the movement, but she continues until she reaches her bedroom. The sight that greeted her was enough to have her smiling—Alexander and Isaac were curled up in bed, Isaac snuggled comfortably against Alex's chest and both letting out loud snores.

Cat sets the bag down in the closet, removing the sling and undressing until she was only in a tank top and panties before climbing into bed with her two boys. The mattress was soft, her pillow wasn't too fluffy like hotel pillows were, and Isaac instinctively rolled over to her followed by Alex. Her smile widens when she feels Alex's strong arm wrap loosely around her stomach and Isaac's leg moving over hers, her eyes slowly drifting closed.

"It's good to be home."


End file.
